Standard 2: Reading Foundations

Students will develop foundational skills for future reading success by working with sounds, letters, and text.

PHONICS AND WORD STUDY: Students will decode and read words in context and isolation by applying phonics and word analysis skills.

2.2.PWS.3 Students will read words in common word families (e.g., -ight, -ink, -ine, ow).

Student Actions 

Teacher Actions 

• Students will read words in common word families or rimes (e.g., -ight, -ail, -ear, -iddle) 

• Teachers model analyzing, reading, and sorting word family words.

• Teachers provide students opportunities to read word family words in isolation and in context.

• Teachers provide students opportunities to sort word family words and build additional words that will fit in the target word families.

• Teachers provide students opportunities to use word family words in games, activities, and writing.

• Teachers monitor student progress reading and working using word families and provide opportunities for students to receive feedback and interventions as needed.

Supporting Resources 

Teacher Insights 

Florida Center for Reading Research:  Onset & Rime Activities (PDF)

Florida Center for Reading Research:  Encoding and Decoding Activities (PDF) 

Teaching Decoding by Louisa C. Moats (PDF)

Word Work Activities (PDF)

West Virginia Reading First Explicit Phonics Lessons (PDF)

Explicit, Systematic Phonics Lessons, Scope & Sequence Materials (webpage)

Reading Rockets:  Phonics Instruction (webpage)

Reading Rockets:  The Value of a Multisensory Approach (webpage)

• Reading word families teaches students to decode words by analogy.

• Students recognize that light has the same family/rime as sight and reads the new word by replacing the /l/ with /s/.

Due to recursive nature of the standards, it is essential that teachers are aware of how all objectives within and between strands work together for optimal instruction.